Situated Relational Designing
Re-Discovering Relational Fragments towards Pluriversal Contact Zones by Examining Nordic Mythology
Otto Rønnest (Student TU Delft)
Maja Riemann (Student TU Delft)
Virginia Tassinari (TU Delft - Industrial Design Engineering)
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Abstract
This paper explores a situated approach to developing one's relational design practice by using critical fabulations to support ontological re-working. Fabulating is used as a tool to re-discover and embody relational elements from the authors' own culture and history. We engage with Nordic mythology and folklore starting from Arturo Escobar & Marisol de la Cadena's propositions for pluriversal design and Pluriversal Contact Zones to guide our search. The work takes a critical stance against how the modern episteme shapes design and reinforces anthropocentrism, patriarchalism, and colonialism. Crafting critical fabulations was a co-labouring, idiotic practice of not knowing that allowed us to question dominant narratives and be critical towards our own design practice. It enabled exploring and imagining alternatives from elements of situated relational knowledge that have been obscured by modernity, allowing us to embed local ideas of relationality into our design practices. Our contribution lies in the use of old cosmologies, mythologies, and folklore to give such insights. Through this, we offer a prototype for designing relationally within, as, and for Pluriversal Contact Zones and invite designers to reimagine their own practices beyond modern dichotomies.
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